What masks do you wear? Who are you when no one is looking? Why do you feel the need to be someone else? For most of his life, Raymond C.’s mask wasn’t just a metaphor—it was literal. He was the kind of kid who belonged on a stage—a natural talent. At ten years old, he played the Artful Dodger in Oliver! But he wasn’t simply acting. He was living in the lights. “It was my first high. The applause. The community. That feeling when you’re singing harmonies and it all locks in—it’s indescribable. There’s nothing else like it.” That feeling would become a ghost he spent the next two decades chasing.
Raymond grew up in Santa Clarita in what can only be described as an idyllic time-capsuled 1950s childhood. Two adoring parents, a neighborhood of kids his age, biking down the block, coming home only when the streetlights buzzed on. Early on, he discovered his love of musical theater and began joining various troupes around town. He would go to school until three and then rehearse until eleven. At a very young age, he worked harder and had a more intense schedule than most adults could endure. Growing up, his house was filled with music—his older brother taught him his first drumbeat and guitar chord. When a friend left a drum kit at their place, Raymond sat down and just…figured it out. “I still remember the rhythm,” he says, while beatboxing it to me. “It just made sense to me.” Soon, his house became the spot where he would jam with all blistered-fingered friends. Just a bunch of teenage boys with out-of-tune guitars having the time of their lives. That feeling of connection when he was in the groove, on stage, or jamming, gave him everything he craved in life…that is, until he discovered weed.
It was the summer before high school when he stole weed from his brother and smoked it out of a tin foil pipe. “It was basically stems and a leaf. Maybe we got high from the tin foil, but I didn’t feel anything. So, I knew I wanted to try again.” And that is just what he did. This time, he took the weed from a friend’s brother…and he took a lot. Enough to convince him that this was the feeling he needed to experience every single day for the rest of his life. A solemn vow he kept from the age of 14 until walking into Beit T’Shuvah at 34.
The stoner identity engulfed him by high school. Raymond would drink from time to time, but after blacking out the very first time he drank, he knew that he should stick to what he knew. That is, until he expanded his repertoire to include mushrooms and acid. Raymond was going through the decades all on his own. 50s childhood. 60s hippie renaissance. Once in his early 20s, he was performing with various bands around LA at venues like Whisky A Go Go. Enter: 70s rock ‘n roll revolution.
By this point, he was moonlighting as Batman. Let me rephrase. Raymond took a job dressing up like Batman at Six Flags. “I felt most like myself behind a literal mask. People would cheer, take pictures, and ask for autographs. Then I’d drive home and have to take off the mask. It is tough to just back to real life after that.” So, he put on a different mask.
After getting a wisdom tooth pulled, a dentist prescribed Norcos for the pain. Raymond fell in love. Once the pills ran out, he started buying them off the street. Once he was robbed on the street, and the withdrawals got bad, he moved on to heroin. This lifestyle caught up to him, and he found himself detoxing at his ex-girlfriend’s. Was this the first sign he had a problem? Absolutely not. That came when Raymond was still in high school. He and his friend got busted with weed, and while he got suspended, his friend was expelled—something he still holds survivor’s guilt over. Unfortunately, he never quite made it to the 80s Nancy Reagan “just say no” decade, and the day after his suspension drank with that very same friend. Little by little, piece by piece over the year, through the masks and the make-up, Raymond started to notice there was something wrong. He started to realize that he needed help. He just wasn’t ready to ask for it.
When his girlfriend at the time caught him using, she forced him to get clean…and he did. She told his parents, and they were rightfully mortified. Once the drugs were out of his system, his ex took him on a trip across Europe as a means of showing him a better life than the one he was living. The world is a big, beautiful place—much more vibrant than black. This did manage to keep him “California Sober,” but when he returned from the trip, he celebrated his homecoming and the fact that he hadn’t had a drink in a year…with a beer…and then two…and then wine for breakfast. He was back.
At this point, he was living out of his car, showering at his job or the gym, hiding how bad things had gotten from everyone. Still, he wore the mask. He smiled. He performed. Until it cracked completely.
Once COVID hit, his parents let him move back in to keep him safe. One day, sitting in his car getting high, there was a knock at the window. Police. Turns out the FBI had been following him for a year, and they were finally ready to make the bust. They found a hit’s worth of meth in his car—just enough to land him a possession charge and a night in jail.
That’s when he had a white light moment…and it wasn’t a center stage spotlight.
Raymond opened up to his parents about everything. He asked them to help find him professional help, and they made it their mission to do so. They sent him to a 30-day treatment center where his counselor heavily suggested he come to the Beit T’Shuvah when his time there ran up. So, he did some research.
A music department? A studio? …a community?
The last one scared him. But it ended up that’s what he needed most of all.
“I’d been in such isolation for so long, trying to avoid people because of my using. It’s like another family, and I was missing that. That’s what I loved about the theater. Having a community around me.” Here, Raymond has found that second family…and rediscovered the love of his first. Emphasis on the word rediscovered…because it was always there. They always loved and supported him. No matter what, but now, sober for nearly seven months, the longest he has ever been in his entire life, they are closer than ever? Why? Because he has begun the shed that mask he once wore. Raymond has finally started to become comfortable with the most important person in his life: Raymond.
Music, which for so many years was tainted by drug use and escapism, is now a means of expression and spirituality. Raymond has been working an internship with The Music Department, where he not only works the live sound board, but also plays drums for Shabbat services. “The Music Department has been a safe haven for my creativity, where I can express myself creatively. I haven’t been playing guitar or drums in so long, and now that I get to play the drums again, and have opportunities to express my talents and my creativity. It’s been everything. Just being able to play music again has helped me become a better person.”
“When I was playing another character, I wasn’t worried about my own insecurities. I felt like I could be my best self when I was someone else.” But beneath every role Raymond played was a deeply gifted, wildly creative, endlessly kind man too scared to be seen. At Beit T’Shuvah, Raymond took the risk of being real—and what emerged is nothing short of remarkable. Today, he’s not just clean—he’s connected. Not just performing, but present. Behind the drums, with music in his bones and light finally back in his eyes, Raymond doesn’t need a stage to shine. He’s already doing it, every single day. One song at a time.
…and scene.